New bank Shawbrook makes underlying profit in year two

NEW LENDER Shawbrook Bank made an operating profit in 2012, excluding the costs of acquisitions and systems expansion, the bank reported yesterday.

It made a statutory pre-tax loss of £7.8m, compared with a loss of £10.8m a year earlier.

But stripping out one-offs like acquisition and infrastructure development costs, the bank made an underlying profit of £2.6m.

Commercial lending rose 437 per cent to £201m while secured lending increased 267 per cent to £163m. And the bank hopes for solid growth in the next 12 months.

“One thing that gives me optimism is the scale of demand – we are getting business that the big banks either don’t want or from customers they’ve laid off in deleveraging,” chief Ian Henderson told City A.M. “A disproportionate amount of the deleveraging from big banks is in the SME space. We get a flow of customers from that, stimulating growth.”

Bank of England staff will visit Shawbrook next week to check if their collateral is suitable for the Funding for Lending Scheme, allowing the bank to access the cheap funds to up lending further.